Windows 8.1: WiFi dropping and/or "Limited"

Unless the name has a Microsoft Engineer title next to it the people who answer are just peers trying to help out. This isn't a Microsoft support forum it is a peer to peer forum. IT seems like the issues are being caused by new drivers that the manufactures are making. most people are having success by rolling back their drivers by going to device manager and right clicking the wireless adapter  under the networking section then selecting the drivers tab and choosing Roll Back. If that doesn't work you can go to the manufactures web site and pick an older driver and install that manually or you can use the same drivers tab to select a different driver that is installed on the computer. Unfortunately Microsoft has little control over how third party companies respond to malfunctioning drivers.

Another thing that you can try is to change the security type of your network if everything else fails. Hope you get the issue resolved.

Everyone should notify the manufacture of the wireless adapter to let them know there is an issue and the computer maker too. If they don't know there is a problem it will never get fixed.

That was exactly what worked for me on my Toshiba Satellite laptop. It came loaded with Win8.

When I eventually updated it to Win 8.1 and the subsequent update, I had the connectivity problems.

Once I reverted to an earlier driver for my wireless adapter, all has been well.

I was also having connectivity/speed issues with my almost new Win8.1 L70 Toshiba laptop.  However, I think I found a solution. The driver version for my Atheros AR956X wireless adapter was 10.0.0.270.  That apparently was the driver that was loaded during setup of the system.  I reverted back to a previous version 10.0.0.263 (which was still on my computer) and have had no further issues.  In fact my surfing/downloading seems faster and more reliable than it ever has.  i'm not sure if that driver was originally designated for Win7 or Win8 but it also works great with Win8.1.  So those of you having continued trouble might visit your computer OEM support page and see if they've made available older driver versions for your Win8.1 machine.  Might be worth a try.

Yes, this response beats all.

Our other computer of same brand type (both are Sony Vaio), but with Windows 7, NEVER has this issue, only the laptop with 8.1. Our other computer is upstairs and is the same brand--the 8.1 computer is much closer to the router, yet it drops ALL the time. Previous laptop with earlier OS never dropped downstairs near router either.

Uninstalled/reinstalled driver, which is the most recent, and it did nothing to help.

Microsoft needs to get this FIXED and fixed QUICKLY, or our next computer (within the next month) is going to run on anything BUT Windows 8/8.1.

Have had enough of their smugness and shallow answers, as though none of their customers know anything about connectivity issues.

Does that change the adapter it is using too or just install/update the software, I am guessing it does? In Device Manager you can click the driver tab>driver details>and select the one you want to use I believe. Check the events tab to see if it added the adapter you are switching to. Thanks for testing so people can see what works